Performers secure £87,000 owed them by audiobook company

Actors left £87,000 out of pocket by a failed audiobook company have received the money owed to them, following intervention from Equity.

Performers on 97 audiobook titles were owed money when AudioGo went into administration last year. The rights to the company’s titles were subsequently bought by Amazon-owned Audible, with whom Equity has now struck a deal to ensure the actors concerned receive payment.

The union’s spokesman Martin Brown explained: “In order for Audible to exercise proper rights over the titles, some of which our members have rights over, we went straight to Audible and said, ‘Let’s do a deal, so there are no hiccups in the future’.”

He said it was “unusual” for the union to be able to do such a deal. “If a theatre company goes into administration there are no rights to bargain with, as it’s all live work,” he said.

AudioGo’s titles included BBC Radio 4’s John le Carre dramas. It was known as BBC Audiobooks until 2010, when BBC Worldwide sold its majority stake to AudioGo.